Is the CD on Dragoon Abilities Too Long?

[Brynmor]

If they consciously decided against giving Jumps AoE immunity I would guess it's because they don't want us trivializing mechanics by completely avoiding them. But I agree the CDs on Evasive Jump and Dragonfire Dive are entirely too long. Spineshatter is more reasonable but maybe still too long.

My biggest problem with the Jumps is that they just aren't that useful and the animations are way too long.

Jump is damn near useless. When I got it I assumed it gave AoE immunity; use it when you would normally need to run out of AoE. Nope. Then I assumed you were supposed to use it like a ranged attack (since it returns you to your initial position) to use when you are waiting for AoE to end. Nope. Instead it's like a super slow charge, even if you use it from range you can still be hit by anything as you move into range. It needs to be treated like a standard ranged attack or make it like the other jumps where you land on the target so it can be used like as a basic charge ability.

Dragonfire Dive is puzzling. It's an AoE ability with a 3 minute CD, and for a CD that long the potency isn't that high. It should be 1.5 min like Spineshatter I think.

Let Jump be the baseline 'charge' skill, Spineshatter as one with a stun and Dragonfire Dive as one with AoE damage attached.

[Zoot]

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Jump is damn near useless.........................


Let Jump be the baseline 'charge' skill, Spineshatter as one with a stun and Dragonfire Dive as one with AoE damage attached.

Thanks for all the replies. They seem to line up with my fears. JUMP seems to be the big issue since it's really only a snazzy looking rotation filler IMO. It's great that it's off the GCD but i wish it was a Gap closer and/or avoided damage if timed right.

As melee we already have more to deal with the ranged (par for the course in these type of games) and add in our positional requirements we should at least have more tools to increase more uptime on the Boss. Leg Sweep is great for interruptible abilities but Dragoons are about Jumping. I agree with most of you that I'd be OK with some of the long CD's if JUMP was retooled and the damage from those long CD's was amped up.

[Purutzil]

Hmm well dragoon itself is pretty strong as is. Very easy to play and does great damage. The long CD mostly seems to reflect the desire to keep the class as a 'heavy hitter'. Reducing the CD would mean lowering its damage.

That being said, the 'avoidance' deal with not taking damage during jump makes sense... but at the same time its giving an advantage to a class that already has it pretty good. In a way it adds some elements in skill in learning to time the jump in the right way to avoid jumping and getting struck by an AoE... its really a mixed bag for me I guess. I guess giving monk shouldertackle a shorter cd and no stun could make up for it somewhat, but still the advantage of jumping to avoid aoe is quite huge and that change alone wouldn't be enough to balance it out.

[Sorensin]

I think we'll see a future patch making damage "miss" while jumping.. I played DRG on FFXI back in the day, but I don't remember, was damage avoiding in that game?